Clint Black and Peter Cetera represent two strikingly different musical styles. But they have one thing in common besides the fact that they both played Tuacahn Amphitheatre last weekend.

The country singer-songwriter and the former Chicago frontman stirred feelings of nostalgia in this music critic.

From the age of 9 until I was about 14, I was all about country music. After all, I grew up in rural Idaho. One of my favorite albums of that era was Clint Black’s debut, 1989’s “Killin’ Time.” I still have fond memories of riding my bicycle along rural Idaho roads while listening to my cassette of “Killin’ Time” on my Walkman.

Those memories flooded over me April 27 as Black sang the opening lines to “Better Man,” one of the biggest hits from that album: “What do you say when it’s over? / I don’t know if I should say anything at all / One day we’re rollin’ in the clover / Next thing you know we take the fall.”

After playing “Better Man,” the fourth song in Black’s set, he paused to address the crowd.

“What a wonderful place this is,” he said, motioning to the red cliffs surrounding the amphitheater. “We’re hoping a group of outlaws shows up and adds to the flavor.”

It was one of the singer’s many funny moments of the night. Others were a little cheesier (He unleashed a few dad jokes, like, “The backstage here rocks!”) but through it all he was genuinely charming and engaging. He told stories and tales, some of them tall, I’m sure, but was consistently entertaining throughout.

What surprised me most was his musicianship. Not only does he write or co-write nearly all of his material (a rarity in country music), he’s also a multi-instrumentalist. He played acoustic guitar throughout the show, electric lead guitar on a few songs and even banjo on one tune. Yet his adept harmonica playing was the most impressive.

Additionally, backing Black was a talented five-piece band, three of whom have been with him for nearly three decades. One of the newer members, however, proved himself a mega-talented multi-instrumentalist on fiddle, Dobro and steel guitar.

There was a brief interruption as high winds threatened to rip the covering away above the stage. Tuacahn employees lowered the scaffolding, removed the covering and raised it up again to provide lights. Black followed up that sideshow by performing a few solo, acoustic numbers in the voice of Willie Nelson.

While his early classics were the biggest crowd-pleasers, Black’s later work stood up impressively alongside them. Still, they couldn’t quite match the excitement of “Killin’ Time,” which grabbed the audience from its opening riff.

I’ll admit it had me too. I haven’t listened to a Clint Black album in nearly 25 years but those classics came back to me like they were just released last year. It’s the kind of music that stands the test of time.

I wish I could say the same for all of Peter Cetera’s music. While I did enjoy his overall performance and his vocals are still unbelievably strong, some of those ‘70s and ‘80s ballads have not aged as well as others.

My wife, Cammie, and I had a difficult time through the first few numbers. Maybe Cetera was still warming up but combined with the somewhat cheesy lyrics, his overly animated stage presence on the solo hit “Restless Heart” and the Chicago number “Baby, What a Big Surprise” were just a little too much.

It all built up to “Glory of Love,” his massive solo hit from the soundtrack to “The Karate Kid Part II.” It’s a beloved song, but I haven’t been able to seriously listen to it since I got my driver license. But he does have a pretty funny story about the Academy Awards that goes along with the song.

I’m still not sure what happened. Either Cetera warmed up or I finally decided to quit being so serious and just have fun, but by the sixth song, Chicago’s “Stay the Night,” I was getting into it. From the classic keyboard riff to Cetera’s soaring vocals, it was a nice little piece of rock ‘n’ roll.

Then on “If You Leave Me Now” I nearly began to swoon over his vocals. Few men have a voice as pretty and clear as Cetera’s.

Finally, 10 songs in, I heard the opening notes I had been waiting to hear. The song had barely begun when I turned to my wife and said, “I don’t care if it’s cheesy, I’m so excited right now.” The song was “You’re the Inspiration,” a highlight of nearly every high school dance I attended. I even played it myself when I DJed a few of those dances. It just wasn’t a high school dance without “You’re the Inspiration.”

So when Cetera began to sing it, I was there right with him, singing along to every … single … word.

Partway through, Cetera took a brief break while the band continued to perform a few songs without him, including a killer rendition of The Beatles’ “Oh! Darling.” When he returned he was wearing a fabulous pink mariachi-style jacket covered in silver birds. By that point, everything was fantastic.

However, I did find that, in general, I seemed to enjoy the Chicago songs but than his solo cuts, perhaps because of the inherent groove in most of the tracks Chicago recorded. That groove makes them more entertaining in a live setting, even on power ballads like “Hard Habit to Break.”

It all built up to the only song that could rival “You’re the Inspiration” in my book. While it didn’t have the same high school dance nostalgia factor for me, the best song Cetera probably ever recorded was the Chicago rocker “25 or 6 to 4.” By this point, Cetera was finally playing the electric bass (his instrument during the Chicago days) and when he tore into that signature bass riff at the end of the encore, the audience went wild.

The song didn’t leave my head until I went to sleep that night, and that was perfectly fine with me.